


Borderlands: Two Steps Forward

by eevaningtea



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-04
Updated: 2018-11-04
Packaged: 2019-08-18 18:38:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16522499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eevaningtea/pseuds/eevaningtea
Summary: During his time at Atlas fixing himself back together again, Rhys happens upon a destroyed digistructor among the remains of Helios.





	Borderlands: Two Steps Forward

Why was Pandora so hot? Rhys thought for the millionth time. He was walking between clusters of debris that came with the fall of Helios. Rhys tried his best not to but everywhere he looked, he was reminded of his life before the fall. _Before the start of all my stupid decisions._ He thought miserably. Walking with a half built arm and one eye was troublesome, but with each day spent out in the blistering desert heat looking for any scraps of technology he could use to fix himself back together, he felt just a little bit proud when he realized it was getting easier. _Ha, I'm getting used to being miserable!_

While Atlas had its own share of tech, he still needed a few more materials to build a new arm and eye. Coming around a bend of what was probably an advertisement billboard featuring the Wonders of Helios, _how_ _suitable_ Rhys thought as he grimaced. he eventually spots a shiny glimmer of the top of a huge red contraption in the distance. Upon closer inspection, the contraption looked like it had half the legs of a bulky loader bot. A thick yellow stripe painted across the main hull. _Huh. It looks kinda salvageable._

Bringing out some tools he found at Atlas, he began the mindless task of dismantling the contraption. Its inner workings were complicated and mostly fried from either the fall or the blistering heat.

'Well this sucks,’ Rhys complained to no one. _Maybe the hard drive?_ He continued working through the jumble of wires and mechanics until he eventually reached the main processor. He heaved the whole thing out and disconnected the wires keeping it attached to the rest of the machine. _Now_ _how the heck do I carry this home._ Wiping the sweat off his brow, he looked towards to disassembled parts of the machine and was struck with one of his genius ideas. 'I am awesome!’ he grinned.

A few hours later sees Rhys pulling one end of a bundle of wires strapped together, the other end tied onto a big metal sheet, on top of which was piled a processor and several other pieces of machinery. The trek back to Atlas was hard, but everything always is for Rhys at the moment. _Geez, when did I become such a downer. Heh if only Fiona could see me now._ The thought gave him a case of loneliness he rather much would like squished. He hauled himself past the last few steps into the hub of Atlas before collapsing in exhaustion.

'No...time..like the present.’ Huffing, he pulled himself up and moved the processor to one of the workstations he claimed as his own. Connecting a cable from his computer to the processor, he settles and lifts his hands up to crack his knuckles, forgetting that he only had one. 'Can’t wait to get you back.’

A sleepless night and some fruit snacks later, Rhys leaned back from his seat in front of a computer. Lines of code stared back at him, bathing the place in artificial light. The coding is strange. It wasn't like the assignments and projects he was tasked with when he was a code monkey. It was more...organic. 'Like...like an AI,’ Rhys realized with a start. He told himself he would never, never go back to the place he was in before. Jack screwed him over and he swore to never let him or anyone else back into his systems, _his body,_ ever again. _But…_ This AI was not Jack and if he was careful, really careful, maybe he could make it work. What would he even need an AI for anyways, he didn't need it to build his arm or his eye. The quiet loneliness nags at his mind. _It wouldn't hurt to have someone to talk to. Just..not Jack._ He assured himself that he would take every measure possible to make sure nothing like Jack would happen again, isolating this computer from networks that can connect to anywhere at all. There were many other computers he could use in Atlas, essentially downgrading this one into a device only used for housing, _jailing_ , an AI would be simple enough. He got to work.

Turns out stitching the remains of an AI back together was tough. Deciding it was high time his body was allowed a rest, Rhys got up and stumbled his way through the darkness to a place he refurbished to be a temporary bedroom. As he left, lines of codes started multiplying on the screen he left turned on, the coding appearing to be writing itself. The final line written, the computer rebooted. What was once the bold orange words of ATLAS shining on the startup screen now replaced with a slighter, more elegant font. The words reading clear,

**_FELICITY._ **

\----------------

Felicity did not know what was happening. Her last thoughts were of furious outrage and betrayal. She felt herself die. So her confusion upon 'waking up’ in an Atlas computer was tenfold. There was no way to access any networks through the device she was trapped in. The only thing she could see of her surroundings are through the small webcam embedded in the computer and even then, what she saw didn't provide her any clues. Just a dark messy room filled with electronics, blinking lights coming from various machinery. The only clue she had of where she was, was the original manufacturer of her jail. Atlas. So someone must have fixed the remains of her coding back together. Can't have been easy, military AI’s are quite advanced. Having nothing else to do, she decided she may as well settle in to wait and see who comes for her.

Eventually a dark shadow of a body stumbled into the darkness of the room. Felicity waited with what humans would say bated breath. The man tripped over nothing in the darkness, swore, and turned on the lights. What she saw, she can't say she was expecting. It was a young man with only one arm and one eye. Brown hair messy and un-styled, clothes an atlas brand T-shirt, probably company provided, and jeans that look like they belong to a different outfit, with pinstripes running along one side. Felicity had made sure to return the computer to exactly the way it had been left. She wanted to see who this new person was and whether he was a threat. _I would rather not die again._

The man sat down and looked over the coding he wrote the day before, surprise making his eyes widen and mouth slack jawed as he finds the new lines of coding Felicity wrote herself. 'This...this isn't how I left it, right?’ The man said to himself, his voice quite deep with a drawl to it. Felicity had a choice. Should she reveal herself what she is right now or should she wait for a chance to escape. Not like there would be any, the man seemed to know what he was doing and if building her AI back from her remains was his goal, he would eventually discover her anyways.

If she were human, dreadful things that they are, Felicity would say she felt anxious. Steeling herself, she spoke through the computer speakers.

'I’m afraid not, I wrote the rest myself.’

The man, funnily enough, squawked and jumped out of the chair to hide behind it. 'Oh my God! Oh my God ohmygod, please please tell me I haven't made a mistake.’

Felicity took his words in with confusion, 'Why would there be a mistake?’

The man stared at the computer, and Felicity 'stared’ back. 'Okay...okay I made sure to isolate this computer from everything, so it should be fine,’ the man stammered and pulled himself back to sit on the chair.

'Uh, hello, my name is Rhys.’ the man said.

'I am Felicity.’ Felicity said.

An awkward pause later, the man brought his one hand up to slick back his hair. '...I haven't thought about what I would do after hah..I fixed you. Wasn't even sure if it'll work’

At this, Felicity realized she had so many questions. 'Why did you bring me back?’

The man, Rhys, gave a nervous laugh. 'I found you among the wreckage of Helios and thought hey, there's no one to talk to here, I might as well fix myself up a new friend you know?’

Now Felicity had even more questions. Her last accessible memory was of Jack’s vault hunters putting her in a digistructor. They killed her. She sought revenge and tried to destroy them. She failed. And now she wakes up to a strange man in supposedly an Atlas facility telling her the space station that has always hovered above the moon, Helios is gone?

'Where is Jack?’ Felicity, though the length of her knowing the man was fleeting at best, had an impression that Jack was someone who would stop at nothing to achieve his goals, _including killing me._

Rhys just stared. ‘....You knew him huh? I guess that's a given seeing as you came from a Hyperion digistructor.’

'I did not come from a digistructor, I was forced there.’ Felicity snapped.

'Oh sorry, my bad. Jack's dead. Has been for awhile. Until he came back in the form of an AI much like yourself. Except he had a holographic body...and could..control cybernetics...and was still an A-grade asshole.’ Rhys muttered.

'He puts the capital A in Asshole.’ Felicity mused. Rhys looked taken aback by this comment, a hesistant smile forming on his lips. 'You know what? I think we'll get along just fine.’

From that shaky meeting onwards, Rhys started working on reviving Atlas while Felicity kept him company in the form of a downgraded computer. It was nice to hear a friendly voice in an otherwise empty and cold facility. Rhys would occasionally forget Felicity wasn't an actual physical being and would make mistakes when he's deep in the incomplete mechanics of his new arm.

'Hey Felicity, could you grab me that wrench please?’

'I can't Rhys.’

'Oh heh right, sorry.’

**Author's Note:**

> This is something fun that I write whenever I feel like it so don't expect much. If you wanna chat about the story and all, I would be happy! Just message me on my tumblr: eevaningtea.tumblr.com


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